


radiata

by pseudocitrus



Series: lycoris [4]
Category: Tokyo Ghoul, Tokyo Ghoul:re
Genre: Angst, Established Relationship, Gap Filler, M/M, Smut, ageswap au, arikane
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-28
Updated: 2016-04-28
Packaged: 2018-06-05 00:11:44
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,037
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6681667
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pseudocitrus/pseuds/pseudocitrus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Even though the phrase is usually said in a mutter…it’s not like he ever minded being called "Reaper."</p><p>The designation was merely never of any use to him.</p><p>Until now.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into 中文 available: [曼珠沙华](https://archiveofourown.org/works/7720291) by [Lucyair](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lucyair/pseuds/Lucyair)



> a continuation!
> 
> thank you so much to those that have left comments on the previous stories in this series. they were so super kind and i appreciate the encouragement. :')
> 
> hope you have a good day ahead!

Even though the phrase is usually said in a mutter…it’s not like he ever minded being called _Reaper._

The designation was merely never of any use to him.

Until now.

“Good evening, Kane —” Arima starts, and is cut off as Kaneki’s hand lunges through the open door and yanks him inside by the collar. Caught off-guard, Arima stumbles on shoes in the entryway as Kaneki slams the door.

Kaneki turns. His right eye is wide; veins are creeping jaggedly from beneath his eyepatch. He grasps Arima again by his shirt, this time to kiss, with a hunger just a little more desperate than usual. Their tongues meet, and Kaneki groans into his mouth, and Arima indulges him for a moment longer before attempting to withdraw. One step back, however, causes his guitar case to cram against the wall; and, having lost Arima’s mouth, Kaneki sucks hungrily on Arima’s throat, and cups his hand between Arima’s legs and rubs vigorously.

Arima inhales, slowly. Yukimura, suddenly, is much too heavy — and his clothes, a little too tight — but —

“Kaneki-san,” Arima tries, but his voice is much quieter now, and contains just the slightest crack. Kaneki’s eye fixes on him, in a haze. His breath is rough. He stares at Arima just a moment longer, and then his hand raises. His finger curls into the loop of his eyepatch, and unhooks it from his ear.

That eye — that — _gaze_ —

Utterly familiar for its ink and scarlet, and utterly foreign in its depth and its particular quality of hunger. Arima swallows, and Kaneki licks his lips. His hand squeezes, and then his fingers fumble on Arima’s belt.

Arima mentioned once that Kaneki was proficient at this, and Kaneki blushed and mumbled something and since that time his technique has been muddled with self-consciousness. This isn’t the case now. Arima draws in a slow breath as Kaneki takes him in all at once, making a soft noise as his throat yields to Arima hardening further. There’s a scratching sound as Arima’s nails fumble against the wall; and another soft noise, this time his own, as the fingers of his other hand thread through Kaneki’s hair, drawing Kaneki closer.

Kaneki’s tongue flicks, fondles; his fingers caress and clutch. Arima holds his breath, and then releases it in heady gushes. Kaneki’s shelves quiver as Arima moves against the wall — _thunk, thunk, thunk._

A couple breaths more, and then Kaneki withdraws, mouth pursed to swallow every drop.

Arima realizes his hand is still clenched in Kaneki’s hair, and releases it, to cradle Kaneki’s face in his palm and tip it upward. Kaneki’s eye is still dark.

“Did you like it?” Kaneki asks in a whisper. Arima regards him, and uses his thumb to smear away a line of saliva trailing from the corner of Kaneki’s mouth.

“You need more food,” Arima answers. Kaneki swallows.

“No…no, I have enough.”

Arima’s caress is dislodged by a scratching hand.

“Have you been fighting?” Arima persists, and Kaneki looks down.

“Please don’t, Kaneki-san,” Arima continues, when it’s clear Kaneki won’t reply. “I don’t want you to get hurt. There’s been a rise of activity in this area, in particular regarding…”

_A ghoul with your eyes,_ Arima wants to say. But, he doesn’t want to scare him, either.

“There’s no need for you to fight or worry about it,” Arima decides to say. “I will protect you.”

It’s perfectly within his ability. He is the Reaper, and he has no problem bestowing death, especially to any of Kaneki’s enemies.

“Why?” Kaneki asks. It’s quiet, at first, but then his voice rises. “Why will you protect me?”

Arima blinks at him. “Because…”

His answer spills past him so easily that it’s like he, despite all of his might, couldn’t have prevented its exposure. Each word is too slippery with truth.

“Because, Kaneki-san, you are mine.”

They look at each other, and then away. Arima, because of a sudden embarrassment that swooped and wrung his heart apprehensively. And Kaneki, because…

Well. At first, Arima thought it was for the same reason.


	2. Chapter 2

_Because, Kaneki-san, you are mine._

_You are mine._

_You are mine._

Arima checks his phone again, rubbing his thumb over its blank screen to smear away any obscuring dirt. It’s no use. In the absence of communication, his own words resound in his skull.

_You are mine._

Days pass before a tiny, sharp suspicion bites him like a dagger.

Did he…make a mistake?

The idea flings him so far that someone needs to repeat their question three times before Arima realizes that it’s directed at him. Even then, he recovers quickly and gives an answer that everyone finds acceptable, because the Reaper does not make mistakes. He just…does not.

How could it possibly have been a mistake?

_It’s a misunderstanding,_ Arima tells himself, checking his blank phone again.

_It’s just a misunderstanding of some kind. He’s busy. He’s a real student. Furthermore, he has a job. He has never been too busy before, so it’s expected there would be such a time, like this one, where he might be too busy. Additionally, I would have heard if there was some activity that involved him. And surely…surely…_

In bed, Arima holds his phone up above his face, typing out slowly, as if deliberation might guide his letters more closely to their target.

_Kaneki-san. How are you?_

It’s the third he’s sent this week. His messages are lined up neatly, a perfectly matching triplet. Nothing is spelled incorrectly. All are indicated to have been delivered. He stares, and waits, and waits.

:::

It’s a week later when he finally hears it. It’s just a rumor, barely a breath, just a sputter made with a ghoul’s last air, a halfway-formed phrase dotted with blood and bile.

But Arima’s grip tightens on Yukimura.

“What is it, Arima-san?” someone asks behind him.

“Nothing,” Arima says.

:::

Nothing.

It’s nothing.

Surely, it’s nothing.

And _nothing_ is what he maintains, even when he continues his pursuit of the next ghouls, unraveling and wresting their words free body by body with the point of his quinque. Eyebrows lift, but no one questions his more-than-thorough interrogation.

And no one questions, either, when, a ghoul finally gasps out _Aogiri,_ and Arima skips debriefing to go to a cafe.

It will be easy to explain. He’s worked hard — he could say he absolutely required the coffee. Easy. Very believable.

:::

But in the end, it’s unnecessary. No one asks. So, nothing is needed to cover up his discoveries. Nothing is needed to smother the feeling inside him whose churn grows at the fact that Kaneki and the manager and various others close to him are absent.

:::

He takes his phone out of his pocket the moment that the cafe door closes on its bell.

_Kaneki-san,_ Arima starts, and then he stops, and deletes it. This is — inefficient. Didn’t Kaneki say himself that he could visit any time he liked? What’s stopping him?

_The fact that I am never wrong._

Arima gazes up the familiar apartment complex, knowing already, even before he needles the lock open and pushes the door. There’s no lunging hand — no smell of food — no lights within.

Arima shuts the door behind him.

:::

He…is…the Reaper.

:::

He…should…investigate.

:::

There…is one pair of shoes missing, his usual pair, for normal outdoor activities. There’s…a coat missing, also. His usual one, for weather that is exactly this weather.

The dishes are put away, in exactly the position Arima placed them last.

The fridge contains a single half-filled carton of milk which expired a couple days previous.

The bed is made.

And all books…every single one. Are accounted for.

Furthermore, as expected, his suspicions were correct.

Kaneki is gone.

:::

_What happened?_ He turns, searching the room for any missed detail.

_What happened?_ He closes his eyes, searching his mind for any missed detail.

At loss, he climbs into the bed, pulling up the covers and feeling beneath them and uncovering nothing but Kaneki’s warm smell, rising up around him, disturbed, dissipating. Arima sits. This apartment always felt overly warm to him. Presently, he rubs his arms.

Inevitably, the light coming from the window dims, to orange and then to blue. He should go home, or turn a lamp on on, at least, but he does neither of these things. Instead, he pushes himself beneath the covers.

Automatically, his gaze falls on the bedside table, where their usual novel sits. Arima reaches for it, and holds it against his chest.

:::

_What happened?_

_What happened?_

_You are mine._

_Kaneki-san._

_How are you?_

_What happened?_

_Did I…make a mistake?_

:::

He…had…forgotten.

So much time passed that he had completely forgotten the previous era, the one in which days came and went like breezes from one side to the other, until their gentle motions took all the warmth from his body and left him numb.

_Frankly_ , whispers something inside him, _this is the norm._

This is what the world is normally, with no blanket against the wind. No close walls. No one to sit beside him at a cafe. Just the wide open sky.

He gazes upward. People pass to and fro around him, unaware of how pathetically he’s failed, still believing that he is something as mighty as a Reaper. The facts rise all around him, fluttering this way and that, as close and easy to catch as butterflies. He only needs to clutch them.

_Eyepatch,_ one says.

_Cafe,_ says another.

_White hair._

_Experiments._

_Arima-kun._

_Report._

_Watch._

_What do you think?_

_Investigator._

_Reaper._

_White hair._

“Arima-kun,” someone is calling. “What do you think?”

_I don’t know,_ Arima wants to say.

But. He knows the answer, as always.

He looks down at the map, at the rectangle labeled _Anteiku,_ caged by marks and pushpins.


	3. Chapter 3

Maybe.

If anyone were to ask.

Those words would spill out, too slippery with truth.

_He read to me. He told me which words were beautiful. I slept without dreams, and I woke up looking forward to it, and I pretended to sleep again until he nudged me awake with an apology and a smile and a mug of coffee._

_And I — I want —_

Instead, Arima stands, silent, except for the sound of his fingers tightening on IXA’s hilt, and the ever-so-faint drip of blood. A breeze shifts his hair. The snow dotted in it lands on his cheeks, and feels like nothing.

He remembers everything from back then, but it feels like a passage from a book. A lifetime that belonged to a completely different person. A strange dream of a room that becomes colder with every recollection. In that room…

Maybe, for Kaneki, it’s the same.

Or maybe he doesn’t remember anything at all.

Maybe it’s better that way. It would have been better, really, if they had never met again. More than that, it would have been better if they had never met at all.

:::

_I really did make a mistake._

:::

Arima steps forward. There was a time that a ghoul could look at him with one eye and Arima would have to shift his grip. Now, he advances wordlessly as Kaneki huddles, shaking.

And speaks.

His voice is wet, and broken. At first, Arima feels a — but no, no. It’s nonsense.

_No_ , he realizes. _It’s not_.

It’s poetry. Crossed legs, absorbed eyes, a polished weapon. And more.

“I-in…this room…”

Arima stills.

:::

_Ah…I see._

:::

Arima whispers, soft enough that no one else will hear it.

“I’m sorry I failed you. Please…let me make it up to you.”

:::

Even though the phrase was usually said in a mutter…it’s not like he ever minded being called _Reaper._

The designation was merely never of any use to him.

It was only a fact.

He can bestow death.

And life.

:::

Afterward, something happens. He examines himself in the mirror, parting his hair at all sides, verifying.

Strands of it are turning white.

It — it should be fine, to explain. He can say it’s…that it’s something he’s trying, for fashion’s sake. He can say it’s some strange illness. He can be honest, and say he has no idea why it’s happening at all.

In the end, it’s unnecessary.

No one asks.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading!


End file.
